Saint Paul City council members and Mayor Chris Coleman will be meeting next Monday to discuss preparations for a public hearing to possibly restore the city’s name to “Pig’s Eye”. The preliminary meeting was scheduled after city lawmakers received a wave of emails, letters, and phone calls petitioning for the name change. While it’s not clear what caused the recent influx of requests, some petitioners are citing the recent revelation of chronic pedophilia committed in the Catholic Church, said Carl Richards, the mayor’s communications director.

“The residents of this city are fed up with revolting clerical shenanigans that seem to be condoned by the Vatican”, Richards said. “By changing the city’s name residents are making a statement that the Vatican’s lackadaisical approach to dealing with perpetrating priests is unwelcomed in our city.”

Since the 1980s thousands of priests in the Catholic Church have been prosecuted for sex crimes against minors. Many of these cases revealed a conspiracy among the Church’s hierarchy to conceal known incidents of child molestation. Typically a priest would be transferred from one parish to another after it became known he had sex with young Catholic boys. The practice did more to spread sexual abuse than reducing it since the predators were presented with a fresh set of victims.

“The chronic molestation cover up is certainly reason enough for rejecting the city’s name”, said Amy Carlson, a mother of two girls involved with Girl Pioneers. “But when you consider the actual teachings of the Apostle Paul, you have to seriously question why the city was ever named after such a misogynistic madman in the first place.”

Saint Paul the Apostle is believed to have authored 13 of the 27 books that made it into the modern canon of the New Testament. In his first epistle to the Corinthians, Saint Paul the Apostle commanded that women were created for the purpose of pleasing men. He also wrote to his apprentice, Timothy, that women are to remain in “full submission” and that Adam is only guilty of trusting a woman who “became a sinner.”

Carlson points out that the Girl Pioneers handbook encourages girls to empower themselves through critical thinking, community leadership, and self respect. “How can I or anyone else sincerely reconcile a positive and reinforcing message like that with the oppressive and disparaging lessons from the Apostle Paul? I don’t know who Pig’s Eye was but I’ll bet he didn’t make a living by telling everyone that women are the root of evil and must be obedient to men.”

Pierre Parrant received the “Pig’s Eye” moniker because he was blind in one eye. After working as a fur trader, Parrant opened a highly successful tavern near where Shepard Road and Randolph Avenue intersect today. Parrant’s business became so popular that the area became known as “Pig’s Eye Landing” until a Catholic missionary by the name of Lucien Galtier changed the name to Saint Paul in the 1840s.

“Pig’s Eye isn’t my first choice”, said Abdirizak Ali, “but it’s far better than the current name of Saint Paul.” Ali has lived in the city for 13 years after escaping an ethnocentric war in Somalia with his mother and two brothers. “I now have children of my own that were born downtown”, said Ali. “It’s disturbing to me that the city’s namesake is celebrated for teaching that those of us who don’t obey Jesus will be punished with everlasting destruction. The Apostle Paul might even be more maniacal than the Prophet Muhammad.”

Richards said that it might be a while before municipal signs and documents are replaced. “Even if the city does get a new name it’s certainly no guarantee that it will become Pig’s Eye. Petitioners have provided many suggestions including some variations of the name ‘Paul’. We’ve seen Molitor, Simon, McCartney, Pauline, and even Mister Paul.”

One anonymous source who works in the St. Paul City Council’s office said that city officials are looking at the first week of May for the first scheduled public hearing--and then subsequently added, "April Fool's."